The Trusted Advisor by David H. Maister, Charles H. Green, Robert M. Galford
Highlighted sections
Since we are dealing with sensitive business situations, where a client puts their affairs in our hands:
It is not enough to be right. An advisor’s job is to be helpful.
People don’t care what you know until they know that you care“ means sequencing our actions. Understanding and respect should come before giving advice. That’s where deep listening and an in-depth understanding of the problem come into play.
The goal is not to share our knowledge. The goal is to make a situation that a client wants to solve a little bit better. This implies: the best advice is worthless, if it does not get heard.
No one likes to be told that they must do anything (even when they really must). It is usually better to say something like:
“Let’s go through the options together. These are the ones I see. Can you think of anything else that we should consider? Now let’s go through the pros and cons of each course of action. Based on those pros and cons, action X seems the most likely to work, doesn’t it? Or can you think of a better solution?”
If the client doesn’t want to do X, the conversation is still alive. If you’ve said “You’ve got to do X” and the client says “No, I don’t,” you have nowhere to go. Your effectiveness as an advisor has just been lost, and you have placed yourself and the client on opposite sides.
A good process for the advisor to follow is:
- Give them their options
- Give them an education about the options (including enough discussion for them to consider each option in depth)
- Give them a recommendation
- Let them choose.
Credibility isn’t just content expertise. It’s content expertise plus “presence,” which refers to how we look, act, react, and talk about our content. It depends not only on the substantive reality of the advisor’s expertise, but also on the experience of the person doing the perceiving.
We must illustrate, not assert.
The concept of credibility includes notions of both accuracy and completeness.
- Reflective listening demonstrates clarity and communicates back to the speaker that his or her message has been heard
- Supportive listening demonstrates empathy and shows that the listener not only understands why the client feels a particular way about an issue or problem but also that he or she will help the client feel comfortable
- Listening for possibility demonstrates insight and suggests to the client that a particular path or solution may help resolve the dilemma.